Fortune magazine just did a feature on Matt Simmons, a leading voice in the peak oil debate.
Under the ominous article title, “Here comes $500 oil”, Simmons says this about John McCain and energy policy:
“[McCain’s] just witless about this stuff. As a lifelong Republican, I’m supporting Obama.”
Simmons’ Republican bona fides are solid, and the Fortune article addresses the irony:
Why should a man who scorns most environmentalists have to argue that locally grown produce and wind power are the way of the future? Why should a lifelong Republican need to be the one to point out that his party’s new mantra – “Drill, baby, drill!” – won’t really fix anything and that his party’s presidential candidate is clueless about energy? That the spike in oil prices earlier this year wasn’t a temporary market anomaly and the recent retreat in prices is just a misleading calm before a calamitous storm? That we’re headed toward $500-a-barrel oil?
We are heading into very turbulant economic and foreign policy waters over the next decade.
Because the next president is going to have to work hard and be very alert, we need a president who has youthful stamina, flexibility, and high intelligence.
John McCain—and certainly Sarah Palin—do not fit that bill.
Obama does.
Prometheus Unbound 